September '25 Digital Week IV

In-Theater Release of the Week 

One Battle After Another 

(Warner Bros)

Each Paul Thomas Anderson film is treated as an Event, but his latest magnum opus cobbles together themes and characters he’s worked on for decades—this loose adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s novel Vineland is a flashy, convoluted, crude and cartoonish take on an America comprising left-wing terrorists and right-wing authoritarians. There’s some good material here, but Anderson throws everything against the wall to see what will stick, resulting in a tonally unbalanced and unwieldy 160 minutes. The acting is all over the map—Leonardo DiCaprio’s wild-eyed terrorist hero stops just short of caricature, while Teyana Taylor and Chase Infiniti are solid if unspectacular as his wife and daughter, both of whom however (especially Taylor) are shortchanged by the script. Then there’s Sean Penn’s villainous Colonel Lockjaw—a failed attempt to channel Dr. Strangelove’s Jack D. Ripper and General Turgidson—which is wincingly embarrassing, likely the worst performance of a storied career. Anderson’s bombast reaches its nadir when he kills off Lockjaw three times in a couple of dragged-out, pedestrian sequences that add nothing to an already overstuffed vehicle. Finally, the less said about Jonny Greenwood’s typically excessive score—whose rhythmic drive is more repetitious than tense—the better.

Streaming Release of the Week

Infinite Summer 

(Indiepix)

Miguel Llansó’s often imaginative sci-fi hybrid follows a trio of bored young women in the Estonian capital of Talinn one summer whose meeting with a man named Dr. Mindfulness who introduces them to the wonders of a new app that promises a meditative experience but ends up being much more than they bargained for. Llansó’s film adroitly balances everyday relationships with fantastical dream-like interactions that become a fascinating exploration of bodily autonomy and the lure of change. A top cast led by actresses Hannah Gross, Johanna Aurelia Rosin and Teele Kaljuvee-O'Brock sells it.

4K/UHD Release of the Week 

Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride 

(Warner Bros)

This enjoyable 2005 follow-up to Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas, codirected by Burton with Mike Johnson, is another dazzling stop-motion animated feature cleverly visualizing the director’s darkly tongue-in-cheek themes, here following a young man about to be married who’s whisked away by the title character. There’s ample mordant humor, decent thrills and a marvelously dreadful visual sense along with a terrific voice cast led by Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Emily Watson and Albert Finney. The film looks spectacular in 4K; there are several vintage featurettes and two new making-of featurettes. 

Blu-ray Releases of the Week

The Beat That My Heart Skipped 

(Criterion)

In Jacques Audiard’s bracing remake of James Toback’s messy 1978 drama Fingers, small-time Parisian hood Thomas (a magnetic Roman Duris) tries resurrecting a lost musical career as a classical pianist. Unlike Toback, whose film never felt organic, just willfully contrived, Audiard makes the disparate parts—the scuzzy characters and their motivations alongside beautiful music making—snap together as perfectly as a Bach or Chopin piano piece. The film looks grittily authentic on Blu; extras include a new Audiard interview, vintage interviews with cowriter Tonino Benacquista and composer Alexandre Desplat, 2005 Berlin Film Festival press conference, rehearsal footage and deleted scenes with Audiard’s commentary.

Gilbert & Sullivan—The Gondoliers 

(Opus Arte)

This terrifically mounted 2021 staging of one of the legendary musical duo’s characteristic works by the Scottish Opera works well thanks to Stuart Maunder persuasive direction, the colorful and witty costumes and sets, the superlative acting and singing by a large and distinguished cast, and the excellent music making by the Orchestra of the Scottish Opera and the Chorus of the Gondoliers under conductor Derek Clark’s baton. Of course, it helps to be on the same musical wavelength as Gilbert & Sullivan for full appreciation—those who aren’t might think it’s much ado about not much. The hi-def video and audio are flawless.

Mieczysław Weinberg—The Idiot 

(Unitel)

Russian-Polish-Jewish composer Mieczysław Weinberg (1919-96) died before his musical renaissance began with his emotionally shattering Holocaust opera The Passenger, several productions of which were soon followed by dozens of recordings of his varied orchestral and chamber music. Although not as affecting as The Passenger, his operatic adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s disturbing The Idiot is a major accomplishment, as this 2024 Salzburg staging by director Krzysztof Warlikowski—imaginatively done in a modern setting—demonstrates. For more than three hours, Weinberg’s powerful reimagining of a great writer’s painfully intimate study holds us in thrall, and the remarkable vocal performances of Bogdan Volkov, Ausrine Stundyte and Vladislav Sulimsky—heading a flawless cast—along with the Vienna Philharmonic (led by Mirga Grazinyte-Tyla) and Vienna State Opera Chorus (led by Pawel Marcowicz) provide more musical and dramatic dividends. There’s first-rate hi-def video and audio but unfortunately no contextualizing extras.

September '25 Digital Week III

4K/UHD Releases of the Week 

Superman 

(Warner Bros)

James Gunn has rebooted the man of steel for a new generation, but it’s pretty much the same old, with many CGI sequences that become enervating of Superman fighting various foes (even a prehistoric monster of sorts) while trying to regain his rep—he’s considered a traitor to America since he’s (of course) an illegal alien—thanks to a devious Lex Luthor (an hilariously hammy Nicholas Hoult). It’s choppy and diffuse as if Gunn makes it up as he goes along, climaxing with an anticlimax. David Corenswet is an OK if cardboard Superman/Clark Kent, while Rachel Brosnahan is a fiery Lois Lane—but even the appearance of superdog Krypto is more saccharine than saucy. The film looks great in UHD; extras are an hour-long making-of and other featurettes.

The Last of Us—Complete 2nd Season 

(Warner Bros)

The first HBO series that’s based on a video game, this often morbid dystopian thriller is filled with too-familiar visuals of a post-pandemic civilization destroyed by a too-familiar infection that begat hordes of too-familiar zombie-like victims. If the directing often leans into survivalist drama clichés, the often clever writing and solid performances by the likes of Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsey, Gabriel Luna and Isabella Merced provide the sprinkling of humanity the show thrives on. There’s an excellent UHD transfer; extras comprise making-of featurettes, interviews and on-set footage.

M3GAN 2.0 

(Universal)

Did we need a sequel to M3GAN, the forgettable evil AI doll flick from a few years ago? Writer-director Gerard Johnstone thinks so—just turn her from a program that went rogue to an ally of sorts of creator Gemma (a game Alison Williams) and teenage niece Katie (an enjoyable Violet McGraw), as reprogramming sets her up to take down a new, far more malevolent program called AMELIA. It’s pretty ridiculous and unnecessarily convoluted—its two hours could be shorn of 20 minutes—but it is kind of fun watching M3GAN become good, kind of. It all looks great on UHD; extras comprise making-of featurettes and interviews.

In-Theater Releases of the Week

Ain’t No Back to a Merry-Go-Round 

(Ruby Pictures Inc.)

A little-known but transformative protest at the dawn of the civil rights movement is chronicled in Ilana Trachtman’s documentary, triggered by five Black students from Howard University who decide to ride the carousel at a segregated Maryland amusement park, Glen Echo, in 1960. Trachtman (who uses a 1942 Langston Hughes poem for her evocative title) insightfully explores how local and college-student Blacks along with a group of progressive Jews from a nearby neighborhood made common cause to pressure authorities into desegregating the park. Along with illuminating interviews with those who took part and much archival footage, Trachtman also uses voiceovers from Mandy Patinkin, Bob Balaban and Jeffrey Wright on the soundtrack. 

Andrea Bocelli—Because I Believe 

(Trafalgar Releasing)

This endearing 105-minute portrait by director is not exactly a hagiography, even though it shows beloved Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli as someone just short of an angel on earth—of course, with a heavenly singing voice. It’s also a thoughtful look at a man who followed his dream and his talent assiduously after a horrible accident robbed him of his sight at age 12. There are intimate glimpses of Bocelli at home, backstage and onstage with his wife, young daughter (who also sings), family and horses as well as wonderful musical interludes even nonfans might welcome.

Another End 

(Vertigo Releasing)

Director-cowriter Piero Messina’s dour, self-serious exploration of grief about a company named Aeternum that lets survivors say goodbye to their dead loved ones in a way that keeps their spirits “alive” is expertly done but bafflingly distant. Sal, who’s mourning his lover Zoe’s death in a car crash, is resisting attempts by his sister Ebe (who works at Aeternum) to submit to this last interaction with the love of his life. Even such excellent actors as Gael García Bernal (Sal) and the luminous Bérénice Bejo (Ebe) can do little with a soppy script Messina and three others concocted.

My Sunshine 

(Film Movement)

In this gentle character study, mediocre young hockey player Takuya notices figure skaters at the rink and is soon paired with Sakura, a competitive skater, by her sympathetic but competitive coach Arakawa, and their relationship on and off the ice deepens. Director-writer Hiroshi Okuyama’s drama has a surfeit of acute observation, subtle humor and sentiment that doesn’t fall into sticky sappiness—even Debussy’s overplayed Clair de Lune hits the right notes—and the two leads, Keitatsu Koshiyama (Takuya) and Kiara Nakanishi (Sakura), give lovely portrayals. 

Queen of Manhattan 

(Level 33 Entertainment)

Surprisingly, ‘70s porn star Vanessa Del Rio hasn’t gotten the biopic treatment until now—maybe because it’s a difficult role for an actress to pull off, as the voluptuous, sassy and seductive New Yorker needs to be believable or it falls apart. Luckily for director-writer Thomas Mignone, Vivian Lamolli is sexy, funny, and totally persuasive—but the problem is she must carry an otherwise routine biopic, even with the vibe of the grimy ’70s sex-film industry present and decent support from Drea de Matteo, Taryn Manning and Elizabeth Rodriguez as the women in Del Rio’s life.

Blu-ray Releases of the Week 

Dakota 

(Cult Epics)

The life of a Dutch pilot who flies a small plane filled with contraband in the Caribbean islands is dramatized in this intriguing 1974 film by Dutch director Wim Verstappen. There’s a lot of local color alongside humorous and tense moments in an effective if bumpy exploration of a man and his plane, centered by a nicely-shaded performance from Kees Brusse. The film’s gritty look, by cinematographers Jan de Bont and Theo van de Sande, is retained on Blu-ray; extras include a commentary and vintage featurettes.

Prokofiev—The Gambler 

(Opus Arte)

Sergei Prokofiev’s opera, based on Dostoyevsky’s novella, makes for riveting drama—filled as it is with the composer’s blistering orchestral barrage and memorable melodies—and its hard musical and histrionic edge matches the obsessives at the center of its story. Too bad that Peter Sellars’ 2024 Salzburg production lacks definition, stranding a formidable cast led by Asmik Grigorian as Polina and Sean Panikkar as Alexey as well as the propulsive musicmaking of the Vienna Philharmonic and Choir under Timur Zangiev’s baton. There’s first-rate hi-def video and audio. 

CD Release of the Week 

Boris Papandopulo—Hrvatska Misa (Croatian Mass) 

(BR Klassik)

Croatian composer Boris Papandopulo (1906-91) wrote this mass, which premiered in 1942, as a sacred work that nodded to the style of historical Croatian music as an a capella piece suitable for amateurs (and was actually composed for the Croatian Choral Society Kolo, which he led twice from the 1920s to the 40s). With the chorus and soloists singing a Croatian translation of the Roman Catholic mass, it’s a full-throated vocal work that—especially in this superlative recording by the Bavarian Radio Chorus and a quartet of Croatian soloists, all under the direction of conductor Ivan Repušić and chorus master Tomislav Fačini—is often hair-raisingly thrilling in its simplicity and power.

September '25 Digital Week II

In-Theater Releases of the Week 

Bang Bang 

(Vertigo Releasing)

Tim Blake Nelson’s ferocious portrayal of Bernard “Bang Bang” Rozyski, a washed-up boxer beset by personal foibles and tragedies—his twin brother was brain-damaged after a fight years ago—who has redemption and revenge on his mind in director Vincent Grashaw and writer Will Janowitz’s gritty but ragged character study. Although the relationships (with his daughter, grandson, etc.) don’t always parse plausibly, the acting of Nelson, Nina Arianda (estranged daughter Jen), Andrew Liner (teenage grandson Justin), Glenn Plummer (former ring foe turned politician Darnell) and others is compelling enough to keep one watching.

Dreams 

(Strand Releasing)

The other films in director-writer Dag Johan Haugerud’s trilogy about nontraditional sexual relationships were better in theory than execution, but this final entry is an intelligent depiction of the confusion of high school student Johanne, whose crush on Johanna, her French teacher, is the trigger for a knotty study of morality and agency when Johanne writes a book about en evening in Joahanna’s apartment when Johanne was a minor. Unlike Sex and Love, Dreams has an urgency thanks to a  lively script that’s populated by authentically believable people like Johanne (Ella Øverbye), her mother Kristin (Ane Dahl Torp) and grandmother Karin (Anne Marit Jacobsen) as well as Johanna (Selome Emnetu), who is given space to breathe as an individual. The exemplary acting is led by Øverbye, whose Johanne is wondrously alive and complex.

Naked Ambition 

(Music Box Films)

She looked like a pinup (and was, actually, winning several beauty pageants), but photographer Bunny Yeager had a fascinating career arc that is only touched upon by Dennis Scholl and Kareem Tabsch’s documentary, which dutifully follows her pathbreaking trajectory amid interviews with friends, family members and colleagues alongside copious archival footage and, of course, photographs. At a fleet 73 minutes, the portrait seems more superficial than it should—after all, Yeager made Bettie Page famous in the ‘50s with her nude photographs of her for Playboy—but if you don’t know Yeager’s story, then this is a decent primer.

Triumph of the Heart 

(Outsider Pictures)

The tragic true story of Maximillian Kolbe, a Polish Catholic priest whom the Nazis put in Auschwitz, where he tended to his fellow prisoners’ spiritual needs before taking the place of another who was sentenced to the gas chamber, was the basis of a shattering 1991 dramatization by the great Polish director Krzysztof Zanussi, Life for Life. In this new biopic by writer-director Anthony D’Ambrosio, the sad but uplifting story is retold effectively, although the director’s wallowing in the camp misery mutes some of the power of the martyred Kolbe’s story. (The priest was canonized by Pope John Paul II in 1982). Still, this story needs telling, and with the inexplicable unavailability of the Zanussi film, D’Ambrosio’s version is an adequate replacement.

Streaming Release of the Week 

Hidden Face 

(Well Go USA)

In this fervid remake of a sordid 2011 thriller by Colombian director Andrés Baiz, the lives of three people—a charismatic young conductor; his wife, the orchestra’s cellist, who goes missing; and a younger woman, who soon takes her spot in the orchestra and the conductor’s bed—are tracked by writer-director Kim Dae-woo. Unfortunately, after an hour confidently setting up the various relationships and the characters’ secrets, he lets the second hour badly get away from him, as the plotting gets more cartoonish. Still, the strong acting from the central trio and an erotic atmosphere keep this watchable right up until the doozy of a denouement. 

DVD Release of the Week

Spenser: For Hire—The Complete Series 

(Warner Bros)

This popular nighttime drama was centered on crime novelist Robert B. Parker’s iconic renegade detective, the mononymously named Spenser, and followed Robert Urich’s earlier television hits—SWAT and Vegas—to last three seasons (1985-87) on ABC. Urich’s charismatic presence was perfect for this Boston-based private detective who marched to his own drum. Alongside Urich and the Beantown setting, the series’ 65 episodes also included a terrific supporting cast led by Avery Brooks, Ron McLarty, Richard Jaeckel, Barbara Stock, and Carolyn McCormick.

CD Release of the Week 

Lerner and Loewe’s My Fair Lady

(Chandos)

One of the all-time classic musicals, My Fair Lady set Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion—a still-relevant exploration of class and gender differences—to equally memorable music, as Lerner and Loewe’s sharp and witty songs bump up against Shaw’s brilliant characters, the low-class Eliza Doolittle and the arrogant Professor Henry Higgins, whose showdown is hilarious, dramatic and thrilling. In this excellent recording—the latest in Chandos’ traversal of legendary Broadway musicals—Scarlett Strallen makes a feisty, powerhouse-voiced Eliza, and she’s matched perfectly by Jamie Parker’s droll Higgins. Eliza’s transformation from guttersnipe to princess is handled beautifully by Strallen, and the sumptuous music is given a wonderful spin by the Sinfonia of London under the sure baton of conductor John Wilson.

Broadway Review—Jeff Ross in “Take a Banana for the Ride”

Take a Banana for the Ride

Written and performed by Jeff Ross

Directed by Stephen Kessler

Performances through September 28, 2025

Nederlander Theatre, 208 West 41st Street, NYC

jeffrossbroadway.com

Jeff Ross in Take a Banana for the Ride (photo: Emilio Madrid)

If you thought comic Jeff Ross, best known as the Roastmaster General who’s made brutal fun of celebrities for years on Comedy Central roasts, would come to Broadway with his insult flag flying, you might be surprised by Take a Banana for the Ride (yes, he explains the offbeat title). Sure, Ross spits out some blisteringly nasty remarks—and even shows an over-the-top putdown of both Sandra Bernhard and Bea Arthur, from a long-ago televised roast, before he takes the stage—but keeps them to a minimum, considering his reputation. Banana instead is an autobiographical tale of how his family life in Newark put him on the path to standup comedy.

Ross grew up as Jeffrey Lifschultz, saying that his last name “is an old Hebrew word. It means, ‘Hey, you ought to change that’.” Working in his dad’s restaurant, Ross says that he got his work ethic from both parents. For 90 minutes, Ross spins an entertaining yarn that’s often hilarious and even, at times, poignant. But for such a tart-tongued performer, Ross often gets sentimental discussing his family, close friends and even the German Shepherds he adopted during the pandemic—and whom he jokingly named Ausch and Schwitz—even getting the audience to bark a collective “Aw!” when he brings one of his pups onstage.

There are sharp jokes scattered throughout as Ross reminisces about his mother, dad and grandfather, “Pop Jack,” with whom Jeff lived while trying to break into the comedy world. The show’s title comes from Pop Jack, who, Ross says, would give him a banana when Ross went into the city to perform at clubs, saying, “You never know when you’ll need one, so take the banana for a ride. You never know what’s going to happen: you might get stuck in traffic, you might need some potassium, you might need it for low blood sugar—and in a pinch you could use it as a dildo or if you get sad, turn it sideways: it’ll remind you to smile.” 

He candidly admits that bananas can get mushy inside, and a few times during a show where Ross skirts sappiness, I admit I wanted to hear him go off on a roasting tangent. But that’s not what he’s going for with this performance—he had a close call when he was recently diagnosed with cancer, and he also lost several close comedy friends: namely, Norm McDonald, Gilbert Gottfried and Bob Saget. Director Stephen Kessler helps pace what is essentially a long monologue adroitly—photos and videos are displayed on the screen behind Ross, while pianist Asher Denburg and violinist Felix Herbst accompany Ross with well-chosen musical selections and often amusing song interludes.

Ross does provide a bit of his penchant for insult comedy at the end, when he roams up and down the aisles chatting with audience members, giving them a cutting comment or two and handing them a banana for being good sports. Take a Banana for the Ride might not convert non-fans, but Ross’ observational comedy does successfully transfer to Broadway.

September '25 Digital Week I

4K/UHD Release of the Week 

Jurassic World—Rebirth 

(Universal)

The latest chapter in the Jurassic Park franchise is less risible that its immediate predecessors, and the storyline (David Koepp, who penned the first two Spielberg-Crichton films, is back as screenwriter) is not as ludicrous as it might have been. Of course, the main premise of Gareth Edwards’ film is, as always, people getting close enough to dinosaurs to become dinner (or almost), but the tension is ratcheted up effectively and the actors—with the exception of Scarlett Johansson, who tries hard but is rarely convincing—are decent enough to watch for two hours of maulings and other thrills. The heavily CGIed visuals are impressive on 4K; extras are an hour-long making-of, featurettes, gag reel, deleted scenes, alternate opening and two commentaries.

In-Theater Releases of the Week

The Baltimorons 

(IFC Films)

This sometimes amusing but unbelievably slender rom-com stars its cowriter Michael Strassner as a failed standup who, through various wince-inducing contrivances, ends up with divorced dentist Didi (Liz Larsen) on Christmas Eve. Director and cowriter Jay Duplass hits every obvious note right from the opening Peanuts version of “O Christmas Tree,” with the nadir a long, inert comedy club sequence where the pair starts to fall for each other. Strassner and Larsen are certainly game, but what might have been a satisfying short has been expanded to an interminable 100 minutes.

Democracy Noir 

(Clarity Films)

It’s a difficult moment for democracies across the world, with the rise of right-wing authoritarianism in Europe and in the U.S. Director Connie Field’s timely portrait of how one of Trump’s heroes, Hungarian president Viktor Orbán, has readily and easily dismantled his country’s democratic norms is a reminder of these scary times and a hopeful glimpse at resistance. Field urgent chronicles how three brave women attempt to sound the alarm on the corruption and lies happening right out in the open in their beloved homeland, with the implication that democracy is hanging by a thread in other places as well (hint hint).

Four Nights of a Dreamer 

(Janus Films)

Legendary French auteur Robert Bresson (1901-99) made many masterpieces, from Diary of a Country Priest and Pickpocket to Balthasar and L’Argent, but this 1971 romantic drama—little-seen for decades, which might account for the unaccountably positive reception of this restored version—is not one of them. Based on a Dostoyevsky story, this modern transposition follows a couple that meets when painter Jacques rescues Marthe from jumping off the Pont-Neuf bridge after her lover doesn’t return as he promised. Then comes 80 meandering minutes between them until she returns to her lover when he finally returns Too bad Guillaume des Forêts as the artist is as wooden as Isabelle Weingarten is ravishing as the heroine. Bresson does play around effectively with a tape recorder and Parisian nights glisten thanks to Pierre Lhomme’s luminous camerawork, but the film is as big a misfire as Bresson’s The Devil, Probably.

A Little Prayer 

(Music Box Films)

In Angus MacLachlan’s sensitive drama, David Strathairn gives a towering performance as Bill, a pious businessman in a small Southern town, who bonds with daughter-in-law Tammy after realizing his son David (Will Pullen) might be having an affair with an employee. MacLachlan’s film is filled with bracing moments that are never overstated or sentimentalized; the family dynamics are sympathetically observed, and the central relationship between Bill and Tammy is enacted trenchantly by Strathairn and the wonderful Jane Levy. This small-scale gem hints at the interiorized dramas of Terrence Malick without ever becoming slavishly imitative.

A Savage Art—The Life & Cartoons of Pat Oliphant 

(Magnolia Pictures)

The great political cartoonist, Australian-born Pat Oliphant, has been drawing unique and cutting cartoons for decades, and Bill Banowsky’s illuminating documentary provides a broad overview of his life, career and how he creates his brilliant caricatures and his beloved character, Punk the penguin, who speaks truths from the corner of each drawing. Interviews with colleagues and his children—along with the master himself—give a fully-formed portrait of an idiosyncratic talent, with glimpses of dozens of his seminal, eye-opening cartoons, from Kennedy to Obama (too bad he retired before Trump rose up). 

Stranger Eyes 

(Film Movement)

In Singaporean writer-director Yeo Siew Hua’s unsettling drama, the aftermath of a child gone missing is potently dissected, as the young girl’s estranged parents discover that their everyday lives are being surreptitiously recorded and they are convinced that the person performing the surveillance also abducted their daughter. The director’s misdirection, to coin a phrase, is fitting for a film about voyeurism in our connected digital age, and his refusal to turn this into a mere redo of something like Hitchcock’s Rear Window or Michael Haneke’s Cache—both of which it superficially resembles—is all to the good.

The Threesome 

(Vertical)

What starts as an intriguingly offbeat comedy-drama about the repercussions of a drunken menage a trois among Connor, his former squeeze Olivia and Jenny, a new woman he just met quickly devolves into an often enervating soap opera, particularly when Connor, superman that he is, impregnates both women. Some may find it cute to watch these shenanigans, especially when both babies are about to be delivered and Connor runs back and forth between Olivia’s and Jenny’s hospital rooms like a bad slapstick comedy, but even with nicely-turned performances by Zoey Deutch (Olivia), Jonah Hauer-King (Connor) and Ruby Cruz (Jenny), director Chad Hartigan and writer Ethan Ogilby’s film seems like an afterthought.

CD Release of the Week 

Shostakovich—Chamber Music 

(Capriccio)

One of the most prolific classical composers, the great Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-75) wrote much extraordinary and some ordinary music in many genres, from vocal works to symphonies to operas—it was Stalin’s insistence on an agenda of socialist realism that forced him to create rote pieces of disposable music. Then there are his cycles of 15 string quartets and 15 symphonies that are among the most imposing of the 20th century. This excellent compilation of several recordings made between 2000 and 2005 collects three discs of some of Shostakovich’s signature chamber works, including string quartets 1 and 4, piano sonatas 1 and 2, the masterly piano quintet, 24 preludes for piano and the dark Chamber Symphony, an arrangement of perhaps his greatest chamber work, string quartet No. 8. Several first-class performers, including the Moscow Virtuosi ensemble and the Petersen Quartet, give estimable readings of these imposing works.

Shakespeare in the Park Review—“Twelfth Night” at the Delacorte Theater

Twelfth Night

Written by William Shakespeare; directed by Saheem Ali

Performances through September 14, 2025

Delacorte Theater, Central Park, New York, NY

publictheater.org

The cast of Twelfth Night (photo: Joan Marcus)

My first-ever Central Park Shakespeare production was in 1989: Twelfth Night was a star-studded mess with Michelle Pfeiffer as a ravishing Olivia and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio a winning Viola/Cesario, but the rest was a motley crew including Jeff Goldblum, Fisher Stevens and Stephen Collins. Two decades later, Daniel Sullivan’s soggy 2009 Central Park Twelfth Night at least had a wonderful Anne Hathaway as Viola/Cesario; but tentative performances by Raul Esparza as Orsino and Audra McDonald as Olivia dragged it down. And the inconsistent Shaina Taub musicalization, which was at the Delacorte in 2016 and 2018, was anchored by the dynamic Nikki M. James’ Viola/Cesario.

Saheem Ali’s new production of the Bard’s dazzling comedy of errors, mistaken identities and the vagaries of love also introduces a revitalized Delacorte Theater. Actually, the theater doesn’t look much different, as most of the updating was done to the performers’ backstage digs and the amount of machinery needed for scene changes. (And yes, the nearby restrooms have been given a welcomed makeover.)

What’s onstage is the usual clash of acting styles, hit-and-miss directorial interventions and unnecessary additions to Shakespeare’s script that mark this pleasant evening under the stars—a gorgeous New York night like the one at the performance I attended helps compensate for what’s lacking. 

Ali announces his intentions from the start: at the rear of the stage, huge letters spell out the play’s cheeky subtitle, What You Will, wittily created by designer Maruti Evans and illuminated brightly by Bradley King. The cast walks on- and offstage near the letters, and Ali delivers a few visual puns, as when Sir Toby Belch (a memorably sardonic John Ellison Conlee) walks off saying “Ay?” while pointedly looking at the A in WHAT, and Sandra Oh—an otherwise unaffecting Olivia—lounges near the O in YOU. (A later scene where four characters hide behind a tree that is just four letters spelling TREE is far less felicitous.)

Ali has cut the play to 100 minutes sans intermission, which speeds up the action among the various subplots too quickly, muting the comic and dramatic highlights along with Shakespeare’s brilliantly conceived reveal. Of course, the hijinks of Toby, Andrew Aguecheek (a funny but overdone Jesse Tyler Ferguson) and Olivia’s maid Maria (a game Daphne Rubin-Vega) take center stage, with extra doses of would-be hilarity the playwright never thought of: Toby even snorts coke during one of their comic binges.

Malvolio, the self-centered servant whose loss of dignity and nervous breakdown can be blamed on the aforementioned trio, is played sharply by Peter Dinklage, although he only rarely approaches Philip Bosco’s unforgettable turn in the role, the highlight of Nicholas Hytner’s waterlogged 1998 Lincoln Center Theater revival. 

But Ali’s most interesting addition—having the separated twins Viola (the charming Lupita Nyong’o) and Sebastian (one-dimensional Junior Nyong’o, Lupita’s brother) speak Swahili as outsiders in Illyria, actual lines from the play—is marred by them sprinkling the Swahili in their dialogue throughout, so when they speak it to each other upon being reunited at the end it’s not as touching as it would have been if we hadn’t heard it several times earlier. 

Turning Feste the clown into a rapping and singing troubadour, and embodied agreeably by Moses Sumney, is a decent idea, while wrapping up the show with a curtain call in which the entire cast is clad in Oana Botez’ sumptuous, eye-catching costumes is something that can only work at the Delacorte.